How to Manage your Health with Yoga and Ayurveda

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For the Love of Habits

I’m super disciplined when it comes to managing my diabetes.That is until about four in the afternoon, when all hell breaks loose.

I can trace my troublesome behaviour back to my teenage years. I’d come home from school open the fridge and snack and snack….. and snack!

Do I blame my bad habits as a teen for my LADA diabetes? Of course not, but habits do die hard.

In yoga philosophy, a habit is called a vasana. Something you do over and over. It’s like carving a groove in a piece of wood, the more you do it, the deeper it goes.This can be as simple as the habit of driving a car or like mine, the habit of eating things that aren’t good for me at snack time. A vasana isn’t good or bad. It’s innocent, natural, we are all at the effect of our habits.

The biggest habit of all is our identification with the body, this really comes into play with a chronic disease. Because we believe we are our bodies, habitually and innocently we’re identified with the body, hence everything that affects the body affects us. So when the body doesn’t feel well or something doesn’t work, we see ourselves as the problem.The more we identify with the thoughts about our body, the more we identify with the body itself and this just intensifies the habit of identification. In the end it’s a tightly wound spring waiting to snap. We forget that we have a disease, we are not the disease.

One of the beautiful things about Yoga practice is that by merging breath with movement, the mind is happily occupied. Tools to harness the mind are invaluable when it comes to managing our habits. We need a strong and disciplined mind if we are going to maintain our health. For some, this comes naturally but for others, it’s not so easy. The physical and mental practices of yoga are brilliant for teaching the mind to concentrate, to move beyond distraction and develop will power.

When the mind is focussed in on one thing it loses itself in the object. In everyday life this is completely unconscious. Losing yourself in cravings for this or that, stressful thoughts, even losing yourself in your expectations of how things should be in relationship to your diabetes management.

Taking the mind out of its preoccupation allows you to take a breather. To step back and just be. Something we find hard to do when we are on call 24/7.

As the theme for the week I offer you this simple candle gazing meditation called Tratakam.

It’s a beautiful practice to do before bed. It helps to trigger the hormones that induce sleep as well as prime the parasympathetic nervous system (the relaxed part of the nervous system) it’s calming, nourishing for the eyes and develops your will power and concentration if practicedregularly

With great respect….. Rachel

1. Light a candle and place it at eye level in a darkened room or in the evening before bed with the lights out

2. Take a comfortable seat and gaze at the candle. Be aware of the breath but don’t try and control the breath. Keep your eyes open trying not to blink

3. When you feel the eyes begin to tear, close them and see the flame as a reflected image at the point in between the eyebrows

4. When the image of the flame fades open your eyes again and repeat steps 1-3

5. Your candle gazing meditation doesn’t need to be more than 10 minutes but you can go longer if you like

6. On completion of the meditation, lie down relax and let yourself float into a deep rest

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2 thoughts on “For the Love of Habits”

Phew! I can relate to that behaviour -over snacking-, specially in the afternoon and night when, after a full day of goodness, the will power goes out through the window!
Then follows the disappointment with myself. I will tonight replace this behaviour with Tratakam.
Wondering what the word means?
Beautiful post. Thanks very much for sharing Rachel.

Thanks Rach I can also relate to Vasana (which I usually call Samskara – but I am guessing that Samskara is the mental cause of the then physical habit of Vasana). I also have a bit of an afternoon snack reflex which probably also dates back to teenage years when my brother and I would eat many many rounds of bread and honey while watching Monkey Magic…. 🙂